Folk music is a broad term that encompasses so many different styles, instruments, cultures, and people. Folk music even involves more than just music itself… it’s almost as if it needs one place where it can all be contained… a place to learn, play, sing, dance, and discuss.
Swallow Hill Music Center in Denver, CO is just the place that folk music can call home. This non-profit establishment is a place where children and adults can take music lessons, it’s a place where you can see an inspirational show, it’s a place where you can go to attend a workshop, and it’s a place where you can go to share your ideas and thoughts on music as well.
I first heard of Swallow Hill Music Center when I worked in Chicago at the Old Town School of Folk Music. What the Old Town School of Folk Music is for the Midwest is exactly what Swallow Hill is for the West. It truly is another folk music epicenter offering all of the education and wonder that goes along with folk music.
The beautiful thing is that their mission is to make sure that people feel the enrichment of music on a daily basis, and they are striving to do just that. They have festivals so folks can enjoy live music, their adult classes hold graduation ceremonies (part of which involves performing), and they even offer financial aid programs for people that wish to get involved but may not have the means to do so.
Swallow Hill is responsible for spreading the goodness that music can bring, and they are a place that as a guitar geek you need to know about. You can of course visit Swallow Hill and see a show if you are in the Denver area, or if you still wish to support their cause you can even donate online.
Swallow Hill Music Center clearly knows what being a guitar geek and helping guitar geeks unite are all about!!!
Swallow Hill Music Center Links
I disagree with their mission as music educators and community-focused. I am a local teacher and have experienced firsthand their attempts to control and muscle out the local teachers here in Denver. Want to put your flyers up where SwallowHill flyers are? You can’t, because SH makes sure that all competitors are removed by paying shop owners sign a non-compete contract. What other options do you have? Go work for SwallowHill for half the price! This is just another corporate company pretending to give a shit about the community it actually oppresses.